by Luanne Rice
The orchard appeared, green and magical. Small apples had begun to grow on the branches. They were green, waiting to ripen. The ones in the direct sun were glossy and bright, filled with green light. She followed the split-rail fence, driving past the apple stand without stopping. Mona waved. Jane waved back, but Chloe didn’t even see.
Jane put on the blinker, turning into 114 Barn Swallow Way. She stopped the car behind the family minivan. Dylan was standing there, his tractor idling off to the side. Sharon Chadwick had just gotten home; she stood in her driveway, bags dropped at her feet, flip-flops scattered on the asphalt. They both looked up; Dylan’s eyes were hard and accusing. Sharon’s were pools of shock and hurt.
As the two Chadwick adults approached the car, Jane saw disapproval and a protective drive in Dylan’s dark green eyes—he wanted to get Chloe out of the car right now. He wore jeans and a blue shirt, and his hands were tan with beautiful long fingers, and Jane remembered staring at them with love last night, but right now she realized he thought she was his family’s enemy. And perhaps she was . . . Sharon was right behind him, her lips set and hard.
Chloe barely seemed to notice where she was. Her uncle called her name. She ignored him. Very slowly, she looked over at Jane as if coming out of deep sleep. Jane was shocked at the pain in her face, and she realized that Chloe’s reaction wasn’t from just one season of lying: it was from her whole life of feeling abandoned.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you, Chloe,” she whispered, in shock at the anguish in Chloe’s blue eyes.
“My name,” Chloe said huskily.
“Yes?”
Angry faces pressed against the window; Dylan tried the door handle. Jane had automatically pressed the power lock button, so he couldn’t open the door.
“They—my parents—wanted to name me Emily. But they couldn’t . . . because of what you said. . . .”
Jane closed her eyes, remembering the condition she had put on the adoption: that the baby keep the name she gave her.
“I’m sorry,” Jane said. “Did you wish you were named Emily?”
Chloe shook her head, and the motion unlocked the tears in her eyes. They spilled down her face into her mouth. “I’m Chloe,” she said. “That’s my name . . .”
Jane couldn’t speak. Chloe unlocked the door, and Dylan pulled it open. He reached for Chloe’s hand, pulling her out of the car. He was behaving as if he’d just rescued a young girl from her kidnapper. Sharon wrapped Chloe in her arms, and Jane could hear them sobbing.
Their eyes met for one moment: hers and Dylan’s. His look seemed to say that she didn’t deserve the tears she was crying. She saw the betrayal in his gaze, but it was nothing compared to what she had just seen in Chloe’s. She couldn’t speak; she couldn’t even blink. Putting her car in reverse, she backed out of the driveway.
It wasn’t until she had sped past the stand, past the weathered fence that marked the edge of the orchard, past the old red barn on the gentle rise amid the apple trees, that Jane noticed two things that Chloe had left behind: the white bag containing the pregnancy test, and a splotch of blood on the car seat.
Chloe had gotten her period.
A smile flickered across Jane’s lips. Just a small one as she realized it must have been bad karma after all. And then the smile disappeared.
CHAPTER 26
Time went by so slowly. Margaret wondered why they even had clocks here at Cherry Vale. When she looked, it was nine A.M. She looked again, and it was nine-ten. On the other hand, the days flew by. Monday blurred into Tuesday, which transformed into next week. The longest day of the year came and went. So did the Fourth of July, with a cookout and sing-along.
They had a calendar. A very large square of paper, with the month’s dates ready to be crossed off. Beside it was a piece of cardboard with informative squares of manila paper, replaced daily, to aid the residents in marking the passage of time. It said:
Hello! Today is:
Sunday, July 30.
The weather is: SUNNY (picture of
smiling-faced sun)
The temperature is: 85°
The next holiday is: Labor Day.
Sitting in her wheelchair outside the nurses’ station, Margaret stared at the sign. She was in a row of seven other residents, waiting to be wheeled into lunch. The man to her left was dozing, snoring loudly. A thick, rather unattractive spindle of drool ran down his chin. He was bald, wore gold specs, and had a copy of the Wall Street Journal open on his lap.
To her other side, another gentleman was scratching a scaly patch on the back of his hand. He scratched so hard, Margaret was afraid he would draw blood. She held her tongue, thinking of how often she had stopped children in the hallways, telling them as gently as possible to stop scratching their mosquito bites or poison ivy. The man had full white hair and thick horn-rimmed glasses, and she was quite sure he knew enough to stop scratching his own skin.
Margaret’s eyes pooled with tears. Her feet ached, and her shoes had magnets in them. Her broken hip was healing; she spent so much time doing physical therapy, she hadn’t had time for other activities, or to get to know anyone. The smell of urine, from some of her incontinent floor-mates, was profoundly discouraging. The nurses were rushing around, smiling, saying “Hello, Jack,” “Hello, Sam,” “Hello, Dorothy,” in very loud voices, as if everyone was deaf.
They didn’t say hello to Margaret, however. At least, not by name. She had been here for thirty days. The weekday nurses knew her, but this was Sunday, and the weekend ones weren’t completely familiar with her yet—it was the middle of summer, and vacations had wreaked havoc with the shifts. Margaret understood trying to staff a large institution, and she tried to make allowances. The nurses smiled and nodded, but no one said, “Hi, Margaret”—loud voice or no.
She sniffled, pulled a tissue from her sleeve, dabbed at her eyes. Then she put a positive look back on her face. She had always said to her daughters, as well as to her legions of students, that keeping an upbeat outlook was quite attractive and would always breed success in the world at large. Margaret knew, if nothing else, that she had to keep an upbeat outlook.
Staring at the smiling-faced sun, she tried to smile back, but instead shook her head. She must have sighed. Because the itchy man turned to her and said, “They think we’re twelve.”
“Excuse me?” Margaret asked.
“The staff. Making a sign like that. What do they think? We checked our brains at the door?”
Margaret chuckled, in spite of herself. “I know what you mean. I taught school for forty-five years, and that’s exactly the kind of sign you’d expect to see in a first-grade classroom. So twelve’s too old.”
“You’re right,” the man said. “They think we’re five. So. You’re a schoolteacher?”
“High school principal,” she said.
“Pleased to meet you,” he said. “I was a probate judge. That’s how we introduce ourselves around here—by what we used to do. So no one will think we’re just white-haired lumps who sleep all day. They’ll know we were once something else. My name is Ralph Bingham.”
“Hello, I’m Margaret Porter.”
“Pleasure to meet you. I’ve seen you pass by my door, but until this morning I was flat on my back the last two weeks. Having some problems with glaucoma. So . . . do you come here often?”
She smiled at the joke, but at the same time, she felt a surge of emotion—a tidal wave sending tears back into her eyes. “Unfortunately,” she said.
“Oh, it’s not that bad,” he said. “How could a place called Cherry Vale be all bad?”
She attempted a smile, but got caught on a sob. “My daughters found it for me,” she said. “I have two lovely daughters.”
“And I have three,” Ralph said. “As well as a son.”
“Isn’t that nice?” Margaret asked.
“I’m not sure,” Ralph grumbled. “It’s Sunday, and they said they were coming to take me out. If they do, it’s nice. If they don’t,
I still have time to rewrite the will. How about you? Will your daughters come see you today?”
“Sylvie will,” Margaret said, falling silent. “My other daughter, Jane, went back to New York.”
“New York? The Big Apple?” Ralph asked.
“Yes. She was here for most of the spring, getting me settled. But, she has a business to run . . . a very fine bauble.”
“A what?”
“A very fine bathtub,” Margaret said. She knew it was happening, knew she had lost track of the word . . . she frowned, trying to get it back. “Bakery,” she finished. “Jane runs a very fine bakery.”
“Ah,” Ralph said.
“She . . .” Margaret trailed off. She had seen Jane crying. That last day there, when she decided to return to New York, she came to visit Margaret. Margaret thanked her for everything she’d done, and encouraged her to see her daughter—but Jane said the timing was wrong, and that she was going back to New York.
There’d been nothing Margaret could do to stop her.
“New York isn’t too far away,” Ralph said. “She can come visit you.”
“I hope so,” Margaret said sadly, knowing that Rhode Island had a force field that kept Jane away.
Ralph kept scratching his hand. Margaret looked at his face. He was missing some back teeth, and he had some scaly patches on his cheek. His nice white hair could use a washing—he had a bit of a dandruff problem, and the flakes were all over his dark plaid shirt. But she could see that he had been a handsome, imposing man. She could see intelligence and compassion behind his cataracts. And she was glad he had told her he’d been a judge. He smiled at her, as if he knew she was sad about Jane.
“Let me introduce you to my friend,” he said, leaning across her to tug on the snoring man’s arm. “Bill—hey, Bill! Wake him up, will you, Maggie?”
Margaret looked for a dribble-free patch of arm to tap, feeling the strangest thrill at his use of a nickname. She touched his shoulder. “Excuse me,” she said politely. “Bill, is it? Bill, Ralph wants you to wake up . . .”
“Rhuhhngh?” Bill asked, shaking himself awake. “Closing bell?”
“Nah—this isn’t the Stock Exchange,” Ralph said. “It’s Cherry Vale, Billy. Wake up—meet Maggie!”
“Margaret,” she corrected, in spite of how nice the nickname made her feel.
“That’s formal,” Ralph said.
“Well, I’m a rather formal person,” she said.
“High school principal,” Ralph said, nodding, leaning over so Bill could hear.
“Eh?” Bill asked.
“Margaret was a high school principal!” Ralph shouted.
“I thought you said her name was MAGGIE,” Bill shouted back.
“Either is fine,” Margaret said, trying to maintain dignity as the two old men leaned closer, their heads just about meeting at her chest.
“Bill was a stockbroker,” Ralph said.
“Had a seat on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange,” Bill said proudly.
“That’s marvelous,” Margaret said.
“Got stocks and bonds?” Bill asked in an embarrassingly loud voice.
“Not too many,” she said. “On an educator’s salary, you know . . .”
“What about your husband? He invest?” Bill inquired at the top of his voice.
“Why don’t you just ask her to show you her bankbook and be done with it?” Ralph reproached. “For God’s sake, man. Pay him no heed, Meg.”
“Meg?” she asked.
“Or Peggy. Peggy’s a nice name for a girl.”
“My name,” she said chillingly, feeling as if she had somehow wandered into an Ionesco play, “is Margaret.”
“He’s a big pain in the ass,” Bill said, touching Margaret’s hand. “He can’t stand if you don’t have a nickname. He’s been calling me Billy since I got here, and it’s the damnedest thing—I haven’t been called Billy since my mother passed.”
“Does he have a nickname?” Margaret asked.
“No,” Ralph said. “And that’s the problem. Can’t do much with Ralph. I always wanted to be Chip or Skip or Terry or something, but nothing ever stuck. Darn, if I had a name like Margaret or Bill, I’d just run with it . . .”
Margaret couldn’t help herself: she looked at Ralph and suddenly saw the fifth-grader he used to be. Bookish, short, perhaps overweight. Those glasses, while distinguished on a jurist, would have been unfortunate on a little boy. She smiled at him. At the same moment, Bill began to babble, temporarily unable to make sense of the language, and he began to cry. Margaret reached into her sleeve, and as she had done with more children than she could count, wiped Bill’s eyes.
“There,” she said.
“Gurk yon,” he said.
“You’re welcome,” Margaret said, understanding what he meant. Over the years, she had helped many immigrant children assimilate. She had instituted a program for the hearing-impaired. Even when she couldn’t speak someone’s language, she could translate with her heart. Right now, staring at Bill, lost in his inability to thank her, she felt sorrow for her own losses and gratitude for what she still had. On top of her list were her two daughters.
“You’re a good girl, Maggie,” Ralph said.
“Thank you,” Margaret whispered, thinking of how shockingly fleet life was.
“Don’t mention it,” Ralph said. “We’re going to get along fine, I can tell. Can’t you, Billy? Doesn’t she add a lot?”
Bill nodded. Then, as Bill’s language skills kicked back in, he said, “She certainly does. She’s a rose between two thorns.”
And then the aides came, to push them all into the dining room for lunch.
CHAPTER 27
Camping was sheer heaven.
John had a wonderful orange tent with a blue flap made of thin fabric so high-tech it could keep out the heat of a desert and the frost of Maine. While Rhode Island suffered through an August heat wave, Maine enjoyed an autumnal chill—bright sunny days followed by cold, clear nights.
Sylvie and John sat just away from the campfire, staring up at the sky. They were wrapped in a sleeping bag, holding each other as they listened to the logs crackle and watched for shooting stars. The fire threw heat, but they had moved away just far enough to escape the light and see the stars.
They had delayed their trip, to get her mother settled into the home. John had been wonderful about it—in fact, the delay had been his idea. After getting to know Sylvie, he realized that she couldn’t be happy unless she was sure her family was in order. Her mother was in good hands at Cherry Vale. Jane, on the other hand . . .
Thinking of Jane made Sylvie’s shoulders hunch forward. Protecting her own heart, she wished she could protect Jane’s. She didn’t know all the details of what had happened, but she knew that Dylan Chadwick had turned against Jane. And Jane had gotten the message from Chloe that she didn’t want her in her life. Jane had heard it loud and clear, and she had returned to New York. Sylvie had driven her to the train. The sight of Jane climbing aboard, body stiff and jaw set, eyes focused somewhere far away, had crushed Sylvie’s heart.
“I’m glad we changed our dates,” John said, his mouth against her ear.
“Our . . .” she began, still thinking of her sister.
“Our date for this trip,” John said. “Think of all the wonderful things we’ve seen this week that might not have been here in July.”
Last night they had witnessed the northern lights. Today they had hiked up Mount Katahdin and seen a bear and her cub. And tonight, in each other’s arms, they were watching the Perseid meteor shower.
“Thank you for seeing it that way,” Sylvie said.
“What other way is there to see it?” he asked.
Sylvie squeezed his arms, wrapped around her from behind. She felt grateful that John was someone who cared about her mother, and who could roll with the ups and downs of life without taking them too personally.
“This is so beautiful,” Sylvie said, gazing up. “I
never dreamed . . .”
“Never dreamed what?” John asked, kissing the back of her neck.
“That anything could be so lovely. With all the books in the library, all the accounts I’ve read of sleeping under the stars, hiking up a mountain trail, the words pale in comparison to this.”
“I’ve been camping and hiking my whole life,” John said. “And all those trips pale in comparison to this.”
Sylvie smiled and shivered; John felt it, and he held her tighter. How could this be? Sylvie had never been an outdoors person; she hadn’t enjoyed sports of any kind. Her summers had been spent—blissfully—reading. She was beginning to understand that their mother, so hurt by loving their father, had turned away from the world and into books, and she had taken her daughters with her. Sylvie certainly didn’t begrudge her that—she revered her mother, for fostering a love of literature and learning. But being with John, feeling the cold air, sharing a sleeping bag, hearing loons cry on the black lake—those were experiences worth having.
Only one thing kept her from feeling complete happiness.
Jane.
How could Sylvie feel really happy, knowing that her sister was hurting? She stared up at the sky. John held her. For the first time in her life, Sylvie had fallen in love. She had kept herself walled off, protected from trying to love someone who might abandon her. Her teenage years had been spent studying, trying to get into Brown. And her Brown years had required so much effort to stay at the top of her class. Jane’s tragic tale was right there: a graphic illustration of what love could do.
So Sylvie had hidden her heart. She had lived at home, flourished as a librarian, commuted to school with her mother, and let love pass her by.
And then John had come along. If not for him, she might never have known what an open heart could feel like. From the loftiness of academia, she had looked down on her sister. Deep down, she had blamed Jane for what she had allowed to happen to her. Jane, she thought, had brought her problems on herself. And Sylvie had blamed her for not being able to straighten them out enough for her to feel comfortable, to return home regularly. Because Sylvie had missed her.